Memories & Nostalgia

My son will be 27 this week, tomorrow, in fact.  When my children were young, each birthday I’d tell them the story of their birth in great detail, but now that they are both adults, that doesn’t go over as big as it used to…oh I can get away with it now and then.  I was just thinking today about how we chose each of their names.

First we decided that if we had a boy and a girl, we would give each our middle name.  Then we had to settle on first names.  My husband had a baby brother who only lived a very short time after his birth, but he was buried with a name.  We decided to bring that name to life again by giving it to our son.   That decision was an easy one.  2 years later it was time to chose a name for a boy or girl…which turned out to be a girl.  I had a name picked out up until 2 weeks before her birth, when suddenly a name scrolled up on the credits on a favorite TV show that I couldn’t resist..it became hers, along with my middle name.

It’s kind of nice to shared a piece of ourselves with each of our children in more ways than one.

Here’s a more “recent” memory, at least for someone my age, that would be the movie “WarGames“. I really hate to think that a movie from the 1980’s is a “long ago” memory, but here we are, 25 years later!! Where did that time go? I had two toddlers running around the house at the time the movie was made, and we opted wait until we could view it at home on video, and have since watched it on TV, when our children, especially our son, was old enough to enjoy it with us.

In the story, the then-young star, Matthew Broderick, hacks into the US Military’s war computer, and plays “a game”, a bit bigger game than he anticipated, with their Computer. At the time the movie was out, home computers where not nearly as commonplace as they are now, in fact we didn’t have one, so it was fascinating to think that something like this was even possible. It’s an intense story, and guess what, you can view it again on the big screen at a special event AND see a preview of the sequel, “WarGames: The Dead Code” at select theaters throughout the USA next week on Thursday, July 24th. It’s a one-night event, and will include interviews with the film’s creators, AND members of the cast, including Broderick and Ally Sheedy, and the crew. Sounds like great fun, stop by and see if WarGames is playing in your area.

When I was a child, attending church on Sunday was an important…in fact vital…part of our life. I was thinking back trying to remember what the first church I remember attending was. I do remember my parents taking me to Hydewood Park Baptist Church when I was just a toddler. Memories that far back are vague, a little blond toddler walking among giants down halls, up stairways, that is about all that comes to mind.

Before that, I am told we attended the St. James Episcopal Church just around the corner from our home, but I was too young to remember that. My husband had a job down that way a bit over a year ago, and took some pictures of the old neighborhood, including the Episcopal church you see pictured, celebrating it’s 300th birthday at that time. It was later, when I started school, that our family attended New Durham Chapel. We attended there until our family moved from the Nixon/Edison New Jersey area to where my mother lives today in Hillsdale, NJ. Then there were other churches that followed, but the important thing was not the building, or the denomination, or anything but being with people who loved the Bible, believed what it taught, and worshiped the Lord….that remains true to this day.

I love attending a particular auction a few towns away from me, and visiting auctions online. In my book, there is nothing like spotting an old item from my childhood or teen years that conjures up memories that have been buried for many years.

Not many my age can forget the Beatles. I clearly remember the first time I heard about them, girls gathered around at a private school I went to talking about 4 guys with long hair that would be coming to America. I was somewhere between 6th and 8th grade at the time. Then they came, they were on the Ed Sullivan show, my parents looked at me with strange looks as I watched clips on the news of girls screaming and simply losing it over the Beatles. Of course we all had our favorite Beatle, and a collection of Beatle Cards and albums. Every once in a while I run across an old Beatle card, and wish I’d never thrown away the huge stack of them I used to have so many years ago, and wish I still had my old vinyl records that found there way to other hands when we did a mass clean-out of our house.

So what does one do when they want to track down some of their favorite music memorabilia? Rare Vinyl Records and Memorabilia can be found at 991.com, search for whatever is missing from your collection, or start that old collection you remember so well all over again with items that are in mint or near-mint condition. In fact I found a LOT of Beatles items, old and new.

What are you looking for? Stop by at 991.com, and look carefully, they have a LOT available, and some great search features to help you narrow down your search. Great site!

Summer vacations were something we always looked forward to when we were children, they were spent at my grandparents every year. It sounds like such a simple vacation compared to the elaborate vacations many take these days, but we loved it and I don’t have a single regret. My grandparents were wonderful, as I’ve probably shared in other posts.

They lived on property surrounded by woods, with what I thought was a HUGE hill in the yard.  Everything seems bigger when you look back on it from the perspective of an adult. At the top of the hill was a metal shed that always smelled like gardening…manure probably, but it was a good, clean smell.

In the shed was a box that contained fun in the form of rolled up yellow plastic. We’d take it out, unroll it down the hill, and then attach a hose to the top so there was a steady flow of water, and we’d slide down the hill on the Slip ‘n Slide to our hearts content. Oh yes, there were times when the water wasn’t flowing as nicely as it could, and you’d get a nice “belly burn” on the plastic, but it was fun as can be and among the treasured vacation memories stored away in my mind.

Slip ‘n Slides have come a long way, now there are Slip ‘N Slide Mega Sharks, can you imagine? Now you can feel like you are escaping the jaws of a shark when you slide down the hill, but for us, just a plain piece of yellow plastic was enough.

In our town it was the last day of school for the young ones, and a flood of memories came to mind as a result, I’ll have more for you. When my husband and I went to my Grandparents house after Grandad passed, about 10 years after Gram, we took a look in that shed, and sure enough, the box was still there. Now the house and property have been completely redone, but pictures and happy memories remain.

Father’s Day has come and gone, but my thoughts about Dad haven’t. I have had him on my mind a lot in the days proceeding Father’s Day and since. The picture is one of my daddy holding me when I was a baby, I had the honor of making him a “daddy” for the first time.

Before Dad became disabled due to strokes, Father’s Day was usually celebrated here at my home on our deck overlooking the lake. The last Father’s Day that stands out most clearly in my mind was when Dad was well, and my Grandfather was still alive and visiting my parents from Massachusetts. It was a beautiful, sunny day, perfect for barbecuing on the deck. The whole family was there, including my sister with her then boyfriend. He took advantage of the day to borrow our rowboat, take my sister out on the lake, and propose to her.

This year we took a ride to the cemetery to visit Dad’s grave and thank the Lord that he is now in heaven with Him. I talked more about that on my New Jersey Baby Boomer blog.

Last week my husband and I packed a few days worth of cloths, hopped in the car, and went away for a few days to use some of his vacation time and get away. We had no real destination, just knew it would be somewhere down on the jersey shore. We decided to start at the northern-most part of the shore destinations, Sandy Hook, and work our way down, and never got beyond our favorite spot, Long Beach Island. You’ll find a lot more about the history and spots we stopped at as I post them to New Jersey Baby Boomer, but for this post, LBI is the focus.

We have great memories of taking our children there for a weekend. We spent time on the beach, my favorite being early morning or very late afternoon, as the sun is going down. Especially nice if there is a full moon. We enjoyed our just-the-two-of-us time very much, but also missed the good old days with the added excitement of having our children with us. When you’re raising your children, you love being with them, but dream of days when it can be just the two of you, then when it IS just the two of you, you realize how much life and vitality children add to your life…no, we’re not sad or depressed because they are grown, but treasure and hold tight to those special memories.

I took LOADS of pictures, and again, will be putting some up on New Jersey Baby Boomer where I share more history, but for now, here’s Barnegat Light, the lighthouse in Barnegat Bay, fondly called “Old Barney” - what a great history it has. We had been here years back with our children, and this trip my husband took on the challenge of climbing the 200+ winding steps to the top.

And what is a trip to the shore without seagulls? This one posed for me on the rocks that are on the other side of a railing along a cement trail at Barnegat Light on the bay.

Wishing those of you that are able a happy and safe vacation. There are, and will be more, tips on saving when you vacation this summer at Baby Boomer Penny Pincher, stop by if you like.